Burgundy wiped the floor with me. Also I love this game

[DukeDayve]

It has its flaws but... it's just fantastic. So is CK2. I was taking a break from EUIV as I played it for about a week non-stop after it launched, but I came back yesterday and decided to play a game as France. I figure if I play it from the very first start date right to the end, experimenting with everything (trade, colonies, lots and lotsa wars) then I'll fully learn the mechanics of the game and can go on to enjoy much more challenging nations. Anyway I won the Hundred Years' War and forced England to give me Labourd, Gascon and some cash in the peace deal. I only had 50% war score... I would have gone on forever and forced them to give me everything but my war exhaustion was over 9000 and rebellion warnings everywhere so I quit while I was ahead. Anyway I fixed all that, got myself stable and whatnot and thought I was sitting pretty. An early superpower, perhaps, with my army of 26,000 infantry and 9,000 cavalry. Even began having dreams of naval adventures and started building a fleet with big ships and everything. So understandably I scoffed at Burgundy and their declaration of war to take Champagne.

I began by putting the military slider to maximum overdrive. My army is in Paris, right at your border, what are you going to do? All you have is 12,000 men and a few 1-province vassals with silly 2-unit armies. I'm going to punish you for your insolence! Oh... your army of 12,000 men is at full morale and is heading for Paris, where my army is waiting for its morale bar to fill up? No problem, I'll just run away until it fills up and then fight you. Oh... your army will arrive in Paris 3 days before mine escapes? Well whatever. I have 1/3 of your morale but I have almost 3x as many troops. Oh... you won with almost no casualties? No matter. I will reinforce during my shattered retreat. You're not taking my champagne. Oh... you're following right behind my army. Damn. You beat me again. Oh... my army is gone. Not to worry! I still have lots of money. I will recruit mercenaries and raise new soldiers and run away while I combine them. Oh... your silly 1-province vassals and allies are going to destroy each unit the moment I raise them? WHERE'S ALL MY MANPOWER GONE?! Alright fine you can have Champagne. Please take some other provinces as well just LEAVE ME ALONE!

And thus, I gained peace. A humiliating peace that left me very angry. And yet, not one year later, the Burgundian Succession Crisis kicked in and I got back Champagne and those border provinces... and half of their other provinces besides. So basically about 80,000 men (not including the garrisons and civilians who died during the sieges) died for literally nothing... because now I have your lands.

Oh well. I'm a superpower again. This time I got 35,000 infantry and 10,000 cavalry. I suppose you've all experienced similar things and my story isn't that fantastic. I suppose I'm really just saying thanks to Paradox for making these games. They're games I'll never get tired of playing and they're products I have never regretted spending money on. So thanks. If you didn't make these I'd be stuck with Rome 2.

 

[Revshawn]

New game announced! Paradox announces Rome reboot!

 

[mocoman2001]

your using to much cav compared to inf. for my stacks i tend to use a 6inf 2cav 6art. Im also glad your enjoying the game so much

 

[mocoman2001]

New game announced! Paradox announces Rome reboot!

are they really, or are you just getting my hopes up.

 

[DukeDayve]

your using to much cav compared to inf. for my stacks i tend to use a 6inf 2cav 6art. Im also glad your enjoying the game so much

So you'd recommend my armies are 33.3% cavalry, 66.6% infantry?

Would anybody else recommend this? I've never known what % of cavalry to infantry I should use as western nations.

 

[psyciceman]

So you'd recommend my armies are 33.3% cavalry, 66.6% infantry?

Would anybody else recommend this? I've never known what % of cavalry to infantry I should use as western nations.

More or less, the "limit" (to get the combined arms bonus) is 50% compared to your infantry (for western tech), however having 30-40% is most beneficial early game cause if you lose infantry while sitting on 50% cav you will then go over the limit and start getting penalties.

Later on cavalry loses it's effectiveness compared to artillery so you'll wanna start fazing out some cav in favour for artillery (I believe it's around about military tech 16, maybe earlier).

Personally I tend to use 10 or 20 stacks (if I can afford to) made of 7/1/2 (or 14/2/4)

 

[zodium]

So you'd recommend my armies are 33.3% cavalry, 66.6% infantry?

Would anybody else recommend this? I've never known what % of cavalry to infantry I should use as western nations.

Cavalry, after tech 7, is only good for flanking, regardless of what the game wrongly tells you. Your "flanking capacity" is equal to your units' maneuver, and all units have base 2 maneuver. On top of those 2 flanking regiments, add your maneuver bonus from technology. In practice, you should field 4 cavalry in the early game due to high casualties, then 6 around 1500, then 8 around 1600, and then just 8. Use the gold you save on not having a ton of cavalry on artillery. Artillery saves lives, and lives are money! All that gold you're not spending replacing your guys thanks to your artillery is money you can spend on more artillery to save more lives and money.

The army you field is optimal when the full combat width's front line is full of infantry, except an amount of cavalry equal to your maneuver, and the full combat width's back row is filled with artillery. This holds for the entire post-MIL 7 game. It is not possible, or at least so unlikely it may as well be, to lose a battle against an AI army with this army configuration unless you engage with a substantial tech, general or terrain disadvantage.

 

[alecsandru010]

Well, mid-late game i don't even bother with cav at all. Mass infantry+arty all the way.

 

[Djoums]

The army you field is optimal when the full combat width's front line is full of infantry, except an amount of cavalry equal to your maneuver, and the full combat width's back row is filled with artillery.

Yes but in practice that can be very hard to achieve due to provinces supply limits and/or the fact you don't have the forcelimit/economy to sustain such stacks. So let's say your combat width is 25 but you can only field 25 units, what composition would you take then ? Half of each row ?

 

[DukeDayve]

Thanks for the advice everybody. Maybe now I'll stop losing battles where I massively outnumber the enemy AND have a good general =D

 

[Gustav91]

Well you make it easy when you say cavalry ain't useful. Yes it loses power as time goes. But you have the modifiers that are built in too. The shock modifier for cavalry is twice infantry at tech level 4. Mil tech 6 infantry will destroy cavalry with no doubt. Tech 8 will make cavalry advantage in shock but taking a lot damage in fire since infantry will shoot them down. Tech 11 will balance things out again. And so tech goes on, when artillery shows up infantry and cavalry still beets them and then tech will first at tech 18 artillery will become really useful at battlefields from 22 onwards they are devastating this is when you need a lot, I mean a lot of artillery. But you have one more thing that you need to look at when you design the optimal army. First you have your pips on the troop type of choice, then modifiers for art/inf/cav and then your generals. I mean, I had as my Bavarian army fighting in open plains really cavalry heavy for western nation. 40% cavalry 60% infantry and a few art regiments, my General was 1/6/4/2, Shock was his thing the first days of battle I took a lot of casualties then shock phase come. Breaking the enemy(french) down totally. Yes the best allround armies in the west are relying on a lot of infantry. But critical tech levels and generals do their job too.

 

[zodium]

Yes but in practice that can be very hard to achieve due to provinces supply limits and/or the fact you don't have the forcelimit/economy to sustain such stacks. So let's say your combat width is 25 but you can only field 25 units, what composition would you take then ? Half of each row ?

Right. Well, you'd probably want to field an even number, but even if supply limits weren't a problem, you'd obviously still want to split your army and recombine, so you're the one getting the terrain advantage.

Well you make it easy when you say cavalry ain't useful. Yes it loses power as time goes. But you have the modifiers that are built in too. The shock modifier for cavalry is twice infantry at tech level 4. Mil tech 6 infantry will destroy cavalry with no doubt. Tech 8 will make cavalry advantage in shock but taking a lot damage in fire since infantry will shoot them down. Tech 11 will balance things out again. And so tech goes on, when artillery shows up infantry and cavalry still beets them and then tech will first at tech 18 artillery will become really useful at battlefields from 22 onwards they are devastating this is when you need a lot, I mean a lot of artillery. But you have one more thing that you need to look at when you design the optimal army. First you have your pips on the troop type of choice, then modifiers for art/inf/cav and then your generals. I mean, I had as my Bavarian army fighting in open plains really cavalry heavy for western nation. 40% cavalry 60% infantry and a few art regiments, my General was 1/6/4/2, Shock was his thing the first days of battle I took a lot of casualties then shock phase come. Breaking the enemy(french) down totally. Yes the best allround armies in the west are relying on a lot of infantry. But critical tech levels and generals do their job too.

The fact that artillery becomes better with higher technology says nothing of its initial usefulness. Ducat-for-ducat, artillery packs a better punch than cavalry does from the moment it becomes available. Maybe if the defense advantage was less enormous, there'd be room to discuss the finer points of the underlying equations of whether cavalry or combat provides better combat ability at which ratios, but it's just not an even fight when artillery adds 50% defense to the front line. Even ignoring the firepower entirely, you need that gold and manpower protected much more than you need anything else.

 

[Anthropoid]

For France I use stacks of 12/2/8 or before arty 20/2. Don't see Cav doing much for me, and when you combine three stacks into one province battle, Voila! You got 6 cav in the fight.

Surprised Burgundy jumped you that early. I guess it was the Aggressive Expansion. You playing ironman? If you want a slightly more 'forgiving' start, check out my Hundred Years War Historical 1444 Start mod (Steam name is "Diche Bach").

I find the key with this game is to only be annexing a province about once every 2.5 years or thereabouts. Get too rushed about annexing stuff and you get high AE and Burgundy starts getting surly.

 

[BigHamster]

Also a fact to consider, with all the other even parameters, when you cross the river you get like 7-15% penalty to troop power, when you attack in hills its more like 30% and NEVER EVER attack in mountains, withdraw your troops whenever it possible, cause if you even outnomber 3 to 1, it doesnt guarante then you win. And in any case your losses will be enormous.